Chapter 23
Derby, Derbyshire
They all slept late the next morning, breaking their fasts with bread and cake from the Bell's kitchen and goodly quantities of tea and coffee, which did much to soothe smoke-parched throats. While they were eating, Wetherby came in with welcome intelligence that the fire had not been so bad in the rear yard of the Cross Keys, and so the male servants had rescued all of the horses housed within, not just the Darcys's animals. Wetherby had seen to the hiring of two post-chaises from the Bell, and so they could all depart for Pemberley whenever they were ready.
None of them was inclined to linger any longer in Derby, but their departure still took some time while they endeavoured to find clothing for those who had lost everything in the fire. Elizabeth was able to borrow a dress, clean shift, and stays from her sister, which fit her reasonably well, but in general their party was comprised of people in ill-fitting clothes, walking gingerly on shoes that did not fit or slippers that had never been intended for the outdoors. The children remained in their sooty nightclothes, the boys bounding out into the yard in their bare feet, eager to go home, and little Elizabeth carried out by her papa, whose presence she was still afraid to relinquish. He was in quite the worst shape of all of them, still coughing and with his head looking entirely awful. Elizabeth prayed their journey would be uneventful so that he could rest and heal at home.
With the capacious nursery carriage gone from their retinue, they had to redistribute themselves among the carriages: Jane, Charles, Sir Philip, and Henry took the larger Bingley carriage; Georgiana, Wilson, little Henry and Julia one of the post-chaises; with the Darcys, little William, and little Elizabeth in the second post-chaise. Elizabeth kissed little Henry, telling him to be good and that she would see him soon, then handed him up into the arms of Wilson. Waiting behind her was Georgiana, with Julia cradled in her arms.
"She passed the night very well – just a little coughing – and she drank up her pap this morning," stated Georgiana. "Do you want to hold her, before we set out?"
"Oh – no – she looks quite content." Elizabeth instead reached out to steady her sister-in-law as she climbed into the post-chaise with the baby in her arms. Wilson helped them settle, and Elizabeth closed the door to the carriage, feeling odd and discomfited.
Little William had already clambered inside the other post-chaise, awaiting his family. Darcy carried little Elizabeth in, her mother following after them. Then they were off, clattering through the coachway onto Sadler Gate. The assizes were far from over and the streets still teemed with people, slowing their progress out of the town. Their pace past the market-place was so slow they might have walked, the atmosphere there much the same as what they had encountered outside the Shire Hall the previous day.
"Tr-aaa-n-scr-iiii-pts!" cried a man on one corner. "Transcripts of the most salacious trial of these assizes, of the bigamist Elizabeth Darcy!"
Elizabeth hung her head, her shame lost on her travelling companions. Little William was staring wide-eyed out the carriage window, little Elizabeth was well ensconced in the lap of the man she had deemed her father and protector, and that father was pulling down the window on his side of the post-chaise. To her shock, Elizabeth saw him give the purveyor of the transcript some number of coins, and in exchange that man pushed a pamphlet through the carriage window.
William rolled the window up and glanced over at his wife, took in her gaze – a mixture of the quizzical and the perturbed – and shrugged. "I wish to know what I did not see, during the trial."
He read as their post-chaise rolled out of town, little Elizabeth nestled in one arm and the other holding the pamphlet, awkwardly bracing it against his sooty breeches when he needed to turn one of the pages. Eventually – likely when he reached the point where he himself had observed what had occurred during the trial – he set the pamphlet down beside him, then shifted the sleeping child in his arms. Little William had fallen asleep as well, and his father looked over at Elizabeth, reaching down to clasp her hand.
"Elizabeth, my darling, what you suffered – "
"Think of the past only as its remembrance brings you pleasure," stated Elizabeth. "That is what we established yesterday, my love. I do not wish to think of that time, still less to speak of it."
"I know what we agreed to, and I will honour our truce," said he. "But what of Julia?"
"Julia – what do you mean by asking of her?"
"I did not notice it before – I could not, when I did not recall your attitude in holding little William when he was a baby. But I see it now, Elizabeth. You hold her differently, than you did him. You view her differently, compared to the rest of the children. Your feelings towards her are not as warm as they are towards the others. I do not blame you for it – I should think it almost inevitable, after what you suffered when she was conceived. But I do see it, and someday she will be old enough to see it as well."
A deep pang of guilt wracked Elizabeth. He had uncovered something she thought she had hidden from everyone, but there was nothing she could hide from him.
"I – I struggle sometimes, to forget how she was conceived. But I will do better, I will try harder. I will do my duty as her mother, and I hope in time that love will follow."
"I know you will." He clasped her hand. "But I also know what it was for you to grow up as your mother's least-favourite daughter. I heard her comments, her little cutting remarks, her surprise that you – out of all of her girls – should have achieved what you did. I must presume that what I heard was a fraction of what you did, during your girlhood. Is that what you want for Julia, to be the least-favourite child? To be the child her mother has to endeavour to love?"
He hit upon it with such painful accuracy that Elizabeth found herself bursting into tears as the post-chaise bowled along, leaning against him and crying profusely. William drew his free arm about her, murmuring that he understood and no one should judge her for such feelings.
Eventually, she calmed a little, looking up to him to whisper, "I will not put her through that. I will try harder. I will do better."
He nodded and kissed her head, then they were silent as they drew out of Derby and onto the turnpike road.
They all reached the Bull's Head at a goodly pace. William was not quick to alight the carriage, however, instead laying his hand on her arm and turning his gaze to where Georgiana was standing, holding Julia.
"I know you will do better if you set your mind to it, my darling, but perhaps you should consider whether there is another who could love her without trying, without impediments. Your manner of holding her was not the only one that struck me."
"I – I do not know – "
"Just consider it," he murmured. "That is all. They will be staying with us for some time – there is no need to rush to a decision. But do consider it – whether it would be better for both you and Julia."
He carried little Elizabeth into the inn. His wife followed them slowly, her countenance surely bearing the signs of both her earlier bout of crying and her present roiling mind.
Jane saw this, for she intercepted her sister before she could enter the inn, and said, "Lizzy, you look terribly upset. What is the matter?"
"The difficulty of having my husband's memory restored is that now he knows me too well," Elizabeth said, endeavouring to smile.
William had asked her to consider it, and consider it she did as they took refreshments in a private parlour. Georgiana had taken a seat beside the fireplace and was cradling the baby there, whispering and cooing to Julia while the others drank tea and coffee and braved slices of a wizened old ham. When they had discussed who would take the children if Elizabeth was transported, the Colbournes had come up as a possibility, but as William could not remember his sister, he had not lobbied strongly for her, and Elizabeth had feared it would be difficult for them to give the children back up upon the Darcys's return. But one child, one baby whose very existence was the source of her mother's nightmares, one baby to be parented by them permanently, was a very different proposition.
Sir Philip approached his wife with a cup of tea and an offer that Wilson should take the baby, but she shook her head and continued to hold the child. William was right – there was an adoration apparent in Georgiana's posture that Elizabeth had never been able to make herself feel. She knew in that moment that he was right, that it would be better for all of them, to give Julia over to a mother who could love her in a way Elizabeth did not think she ever could. She had made Henry take the boys because it was best for them, and this was best for Julia. It would be some time before Elizabeth was ready to say it aloud, however. It was one thing to think it was the right thing to do, and quite another to say the words, to commit to it.
As though he had sensed her thoughts, William approached with little Elizabeth and said, "I think our little sweetling has had enough of her papa and wants her mother again. You want mama, do you not, Elizabeth?"
"Mama," stated the child, reaching out for her mother with one hand and making that mother's heart swell. The other still clutched her sooty doll, and both child and doll were given over to Elizabeth. She held them gratefully, drawing comfort from the little girl in her arms and yet understanding this child held a space in her heart that Julia could never occupy.
She carried little Elizabeth back to the post-chaise, when they were ready to resume their journey. As they settled into the seat, Elizabeth looked to her husband and said, "I am not ready to commit to it yet. Once it is said to Georgiana and Philip, it cannot be unsaid. But at present, I think you are right."
He drew his arm about her. "Take your time in the decision, and do what you think best for you – and her. I can love any daughter of yours, but I could love Julia just as well as a niece."
The rest of the journey back to Pemberley was uneventful, a relief to them all after the events of the past few days. They staggered in through the family entrance, tremendously grateful to be home and eager for warm baths and clean clothes.
The only one among them who was not relieved was Kitty. She had come down after sighting the carriages from the saloon, eager to escape the company within and yet dreading that she should have to explain that company. At least Lizzy had been acquitted – at least her sister was free – Kitty reminded herself. She recalled how her stomach had dropped when she had sighted the express rider coming up the drive yesterday, hoping for the best and yet fearing the worst, and knowing that the letter he carried would tell her definitively which one it was. Dear Jane had addressed the letter to "Catherine Bennet Not Guilty," meaning Kitty could give a cry of happy relief even before she opened the letter.
Embraces were first, for the returning travellers. Kitty squeezed Lizzy tight, murmuring, "Thank God all went well. Thank God you are back here with us." But then Kitty stepped back, clutching her hands together. "There is something I must tell you all – she arrived yesterday – Caroline – I did not know what to do – I could not just turn her out – so I asked Mrs. Reynolds to prepare a room for her."
Charles's eyes narrowed. "Caroline – my sister, Caroline?"
"Yes, Charles, what other Caroline would she be speaking of?" Caroline Bingley strolled into the family hall, making a little downwards shudder that some might have interpreted as a curtsey. "I wanted to be here, to support my family during Eliza's trial."
Kitty had given this statement little credence the first time she had heard it, and by the countenances of the rest of them, she thought they agreed with her.
"Caroline, you cannot simply show up at a house expecting bed and board," stated Charles. "We will speak of this later, but at the least, you ought to apologise to our hosts now."
Stepping closer to the Darcys, Caroline said, "I am sorry if my presence is not wanted, but I am more grieved that it was not wanted. Am I not your family? Should I not have been here to support you, Eliza?"
Neither of the Darcys said anything. They simply stared at Caroline until she began to wilt. Everyone was thinking the same thing – save perhaps Caroline – and it did not need to be said. Finally, Elizabeth turned to her husband and said, "We should get the children up to the nursery."
Most of the rest of them followed the Darcys and their children, save Caroline, who had her arm taken up by her brother and was ushered off for the promised conversation. Kitty lingered, and to her surprise found that General Fitzwilliam had done the same.
"Why the long face, Miss Bennet? This reflects poorly on her, not on you. Do you think any of us expected you to pick her up and throw her out of the house?" he asked.
Kitty giggled, and blushed thoroughly. General Fitzwilliam's attention was like the sun; a very little could warm her through and through.
"I would suggest we seek out some frogs to put in her bed, but I fear I am a good thirty years past such roguish behaviour. Perhaps your nephew William might oblige us – he is nearing the appropriate age for such things. Shall we go and corrupt him?"
Kitty giggled again. "As amusing as the thought is, it would not be worth it. She would scream so loud as to injure all of our ears."
He chuckled. "There, now that is a proper smile. 'Tis much better; a woman like Miss Bingley is not worth the space I fear she was occupying in your mind. Come, let us go up." He offered his arm to her, and Kitty accepted it with a thrill that went straight to her core.
Henry had always enjoyed the feel of a lady's hand on his arm. He had enjoyed making Kitty Bennet laugh, as well, sweetly turning her countenance from worried to amused. It was an amusing thought, to consider a woman of Caroline Bingley's stature thrown from the house by Miss Bennet, whose figure clearly came from the same light, lovely stock as her sister Elizabeth.
Smiling to himself, Henry wondered what compulsion had led him to give Miss Bennet far more attention than he had in the past. In the early years of their acquaintance, if pressed to describe her, he would have said she was young. Not a good sort of young, that of quiet, wide-eyed innocence, but rather that immature sort of foolishness Henry had seen far too often, for men in red coats tended to bring out the worst in such girls.
He had paid her little mind; she was a member of his extended family and if he had been asked to do some task for her benefit, he would have done so, but he had never been asked. No, most of his efforts over the past few years had been on behalf of her elder sister. Miss Bennet had matured, in that time, had made that transition from a young girl to a young lady. She did not possess that lively fire and sparkle that Elizabeth had shown at the same age, but Henry liked the Bennet countenance with a more serious turn.
Oh, no – now those were dangerous thoughts. Papa might have encouraged marrying for love, but he could not have meant Kitty Bennet. Nor would the Darcys be much pleased to find Henry flirting with their sister under their roof. He would need to take care, and show her nothing more than familial friendship.
They had reached the top of the stairs. "Where are you bound, Miss Bennet? May I walk you there?"
"The library. I think I would rather hide away with a book until everyone comes back down. And my brother-in-law has such a collection."
"You are an avid reader, then?"
"Yes, it was nearly inevitable that I should become one, living alone with my father," said she. "I love history most of all."
"Ah, you lead a serious life at Longbourn, then? Should you not like to take a little break from it?"
"Not in Caroline Bingley's company," said she, with charming disgust. "And anyway, when you have become used to a serious life, it is difficult to set it aside for a time."
"I know precisely what you mean, Miss Bennet." And thus Henry proceeded to walk her thither, telling himself all the while that it was mere familial friendship to do so.